


Falon'Saota

by Katalyna_Rose



Series: Vhenan AU [9]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Non-Inquisitor Lavellan, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-25
Updated: 2017-05-25
Packaged: 2018-11-04 19:02:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,942
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10997028
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Katalyna_Rose/pseuds/Katalyna_Rose
Summary: Sequel (of a sort) to The Wolf's Dancer (http://archiveofourown.org/works/10779504).Inquisitor Liona Travelyan has been struggling with pain in the missing part of her arm since her one-time friend took it and the Anchor with it. Because of this pain, she's been losing sleep and sometimes takes walks around Skyhold in the hope that it would settle her. But tonight she senses magic in the basement archive, and there's a new passage she didn't know about. An old castle is full of surprises, as full of them as the man who built it in ages long past. But a secret waits down that passage, one that he would kill or worse to protect. Yet curiosity compels Liona to look anyway.





	Falon'Saota

**Author's Note:**

> If you've spent as much time as I have with FenxShiral's Project Elvhen, it was probably the title that drew you in, huh? It's a damn useful resource.

Tossing and turning again, Liona tried to press her hand to her forehead only to be rudely reminded that she no longer had that hand. Most of her left arm was gone. That was the source of her sleeping troubles, after all. Her arm no longer existed, but it hurt.

With a frustrated sigh, she finally gave up on sleep and sat up. For once, her movement didn’t wake the man who slept beside her. She smiled briefly at her husband’s sleeping face. He was her comfort in all this, after one of her best friends betrayed them all. She wondered if there was any hope left for the world sometimes, but one look at the man beside her kept her fighting.

Liona wrapped a robe around herself and carefully headed downstairs, avoiding the places where the stairs creaked. If Cullen had slept through her tossing in bed and then leaving the room, he really needed the sleep. She didn’t want to wake him over this. He couldn’t help her this time. The pain would go away, the healers said. Or it wouldn’t. Either way, she’d rather let him rest. The silent halls of her castle would be comfort enough for one night, at least.

But the stars above the garden, her favorite haunt, only left her feeling emptier than before, wondering if a certain elven apostate might be looking up at them, too. So she headed back inside. The library in the basement, near the cellar, had finally been dusted. It had taken three whole years for anyone to get around to it; there had simply been too much else to restore and maintain in the ancient castle. Liona had only recently begun digging into the books stored there, some of them so old that the language they were written in was entirely lost to time.

Something was different about the library tonight, though. Liona sensed the magic instantly upon entering and cast a barrier over herself before she even thought to. A quick glance around the room showed that it was empty, but the pedestal in the center, ancient stone holding a book written in Elvhen, was pushed back a couple of feet. Where it had stood there was now a gaping black void. Frowning in confusion, cautioned by wariness, yet driven by curiosity, Liona approached. The magic she sensed was stronger down the hole, but she couldn’t see anything beyond the first two rungs of an ancient but sturdy-looking ladder.

She looked back over her shoulder, wondering if she should call for help. Then she felt silly; it was an old castle, with no way to know its true age beyond that it was older than the Veil itself. Surely it was as full of surprises as its builder and original occupant. Deciding to investigate as she would any such thing in the wilderness, Liona lowered herself onto the ladder.

She cast a dim mage light for company when she got to the bottom, much further down than she had expected. The air was stale and stagnant, dust layered the floor, and she kept her light low on instinct; there was something eerie and secret about this place, and she had the distinct feeling that she didn’t belong there. The stone walls around her were deep in the mountain, the chisel marks on the stone indicating that they might part of the original structure since they were distinctly Elvhen and ancient. Elvhen frescoes in a disturbingly familiar style covered the walls of the long hallway in which she stood, time weathered and crumbling but still visible in places. As she traveled slowly down the passageway, Liona saw that most of them, as she might have expected if she’d thought about it for a moment, depicted the Dread Wolf during his rebellion. Yet each image she could make out had one distinct difference from all other depictions of Fen’Harel that she had ever seen; there was a second figure at the Dread Wolf’s side who seemed to be his equal in every way. The figure was painted with symbols of a halla, most often the distinctive horns, and was unmistakably female. Liona frowned as she observed hip length hair the color of cream and pale lavender eyes, any more vibrant colors faded to soft pastels. She was an elf of remarkable beauty, and she stood at Fen’Harel’s side in every single fresco that remained. It was unlike anything she had ever seen.

There was a whisper of sound as she neared a door at the end of the long hallway and she immediately put out her light. The moment she was thrown into darkness she realized that a light even dimmer than the one she had cast was spilling out from beneath the ancient door. Liona swallowed hard and almost turned around to fetch the guard when a voice stopped her.

“Andaran atishan, vhenan.” The voice was so familiar that Liona grabbed the stump of her left arm as pain shot through it again. Solas. And after her time studying with him, she understood what he said. A greeting, followed by the word for heart? It was an endearment, she knew, but she had never heard him use it since it was most commonly said by lovers. What was happening? What was in the room beyond the door?

Liona pressed her hand flat against the door and was about to push it open and confront Solas when another voice answered his greeting. This new voice was feminine and low and it shivered down her spine, laced with magic.

“Vhenan, ma sa’lath,” the woman said on a sigh. More endearments. But who was she? More words poured from her lips, lyrical elven in a musical voice, but Liona couldn’t understand them. She asked a question. She received an answer that sounded like a strange measurement of time. A moment of silence followed in which Liona almost threw open the door, then the woman asked another question. Solas sighed, sounding overwhelmed, but didn’t answer immediately, and Liona could wait no longer.

The door was heavy and it groaned from the movement, as loud as a shout compared to the earlier quiet. A bold of magic struck Liona’s shields as the door swung open, but it was meant to stun, not to kill, and she repelled it easily. No more magic followed.

Past the door was something Liona had never thought to see but which she recognized easily from her studies; the resting chamber of an ancient elf. Or rather, a pair of elves, since two coffins lay side by side, their pillows and blankets long since disintegrated. The furthest coffin was empty, its occupant either gone or reduced to dust, but in the nearest coffin a woman sat upright, her hip length hair like cream and her violet eyes wide.

Liona caught only a glimpse of the woman before Solas stepped in front of her and blocked her view. A moment later she could see the top of the woman’s head and those startlingly vibrant eyes as she peaked over Solas’s shoulder.

“Inquisitor,” Solas greeted cautiously, his hands outspread, palms facing back, to protect or perhaps contain the woman behind him.

“Maker’s breath, what is this, Solas?” Liona asked, stunned. The woman, who was tilting her head curiously, was unmistakably the same woman painted in the frescoes in the hall. She asked another question in Elvhen that Liona couldn’t understand, her rudimentary knowledge of the language not nearly sufficient to follow the quick tumble of unknown words. Solas pressed his lips together but did not answer, and the silence stretched into discomfort as everyone waited for the other shoe to drop.

“I couldn’t sleep,” Liona said conversationally, hoping to draw the truth from the man before her and avoid a fight. She looked down at her missing limb, careful to keep the pair of them in sight. “Phantom Limb, the healers call it. I still it’s insane that flesh that no longer exists can hurt so much.” She thought she saw him flinch subtly. “I thought a stroll through my castle might help, but I was quite surprised to sense magic in the basement archive. I was shocked to find a passage I didn’t know about in the middle of the room! But a place as old as this is bound to have secrets, right? So I went exploring. And I found painfully familiar frescoes, all with one detail different from any others I’ve seen. And then I heard a voice and I thought about fetching the guards. Except that I recognized the voice I know how little good a few guards would be against this intruder. I’ve seen it firsthand, the statues that were once people. So rather than futilely risk lives, I thought I might risk only mine to find out why Fen’Harel is in my castle.”

“Fen’Harel ma ghilana?” the woman asked Liona, curiosity in her piercing gaze. Liona frowned at her, uncomprehending.

“Vhenan!” Solas said sharply, turning from Liona only long enough to shake his head at the woman behind him. Then he turned his gaze back to Liona, his onetime friend, assessing. “If I tell you, will you still force me to fight my way out?” he asked her. She raised her brows, surprised. “If you hadn’t wandered into the archive, we would have been long gone by morning and no one would ever know we’d been here. I have no wish to fight you or the Inquisition soldiers. I would rather leave here peacefully.” Liona thought about it for a long moment. That Solas was attempting to bargain for safe passage told her that one or both of the people before her was vulnerable. Judging from the state of the woman, her hair and skin covered in a fine layer of dust and nothing but Solas’s long tunic to cover her nudity, she guessed that the woman was the weak point but she wasn’t certain how to use that to her advantage.

“To have my curiosity sated, I will allow you to leave this place without raising the alarm,” Liona finally promised. She hoped that the information would be worth letting them go, but she knew she couldn’t match Solas. He was asking because they had once been friends and to keep the woman behind him safe, but he would level Skyhold and everyone in it if he had to. He was too committed to his cause not to.

Solas exhaled wearily and sat on the rim of the coffin, taking the woman’s hand. She used her other to brush her fingertips lightly down his cheek. She looked at him with wide, trusting eyes, almost innocent in her ignorance of what was happening around her.

“This is Lyna,” Solas said. Lyna smiled at Liona when she heard her name. “She is even older than I am, but she slept on when I woke. I passed the centuries since I created the Veil in this very room, hidden by magic and a rather clever secret door. I went to sleep not because I wanted to, but because I had no choice. I would not have abandoned my people otherwise. But uthenera forced itself upon me after the immense power expenditure of creating the Veil. Lyna went to sleep when I did because she would not be parted from me. We had been married for six centuries when we entered uthenera.”

Liona felt her jaw drop but didn’t have the presence of mind to pick it up off the dusty floor. Lyna laid her hand over Solas’s where it clenched in his lap, and it was then that Liona realized that her hands bore the same intricate tracery of thin white scars that his did.

“Those scars on your hands…” she managed to whisper. Solas nodded.

“A part of ancient marriage rituals,” he said, his eyes on Lyna’s face as if she gave strength with her gaze. Liona recognized the look, for she shared it with Cullen often enough. “Hand fasting is quite similar and likely derived from the ancient ceremony. A ribbon made of magic is wrapped around the hands of those being wed. When the vows are complete, the ribbon becomes a part of them and they become eternally connected unless the ribbon is removed by those now wed.” He ran a finger over one of the scars on Lyna’s hand, and she smiled.

“Falon’saota,” she said lovingly, and Solas tightened his grip on her.

“Spouse. It means spouse,” he translated.

“Why didn’t she wake when you did?” Liona finally managed to ask.

“Though she is the elder, my power is the greater,” he said easily. “After so long asleep, she did not have the strength to wake on her own. And when I woke I did not have the strength to rouse her. And so she has remained here, waiting for me.”

“Why isn’t she mentioned in the legends?” Liona asked next. “Nothing in any histories or myths mentions that the Dread Wolf was married!” Solas chuckled darkly.

“Why would she be mentioned?” he asked backed. “I was the traitor, the Bringer of Nightmares. She… she was the Wolf’s Dancer, the Halla, a healer and a hunter. She led the rebellion at my side, yes, but she worked mostly unseen. During the war, she was my spymaster. She hunted to provide food for the slaves we freed. She healed the sick and injured. She was not a commander, not unless she had to be.

“And before the war, she was a slave, a huntress for Mythal’s court. And before that she was one of Ghilan’nain’s little birds, trained as a dancer and… a courtesan. We met when she was given to me as a gift after a battle. I was meant to use her for my pleasure for a night and then send her back to her mistress. I did not. Instead, I bought her from Ghilan’nain. She became my wife less than a century later.” He finally lifted his gaze to Liona’s, and his eyes were filled with ancient fury and sorrow. For the first time, he truly looked his age.

“She is why I left the service of Mythal. She was the spark that lit the fire of my rebellion,” he told her, his voice low and rough with emotion. “I could not stand by and watch her suffer. I could not allow it when I saw how mistreated she was by Ghilan’nain. I could not allow it when she was beaten by Mythal’s noble simply because she was in the wrong place at the wrong time. But the final straw that broke my back was when two of Mythal’s nobles who had once purchased her company from her mistress raped her in Mythal’s palace and Mythal… did nothing. Lyna had the right to refuse to bed them. Mythal promised when Lyna entered her service that she could choose her lovers for herself. It was Mythal’s duty to punish her nobles for violating her slave, yet she did _nothing._ I could not stay after that. _We_ could not stay.”

Liona was silent while Lyna stroked Solas’s face with gentle fingers, soothing him. She ran her nails lightly along her husband’s bare scalp, then smiled and spoke in Elvhen, her tone teasing. Solas’s stiff shoulders relaxed just a little as he ran a hand over his bare head as if self-conscious.

“Is she teasing you about your baldness?” Liona asked, surprised. Anything to break the silence.

“I had… quite a bit of hair the last time she saw me,” he admitted, sounding uncomfortable. They were silent for a moment longer, until Lyna, who had been looking between them with increasing frustration, sighed heavily and gathered magic in her form. Liona stiffened and recast her barrier, but no attack came.

“There,” Lyna said in Common, making Liona’s brows meet her hairline. Lyna slumped a bit and blinked hard, the magic in her voice stronger and glinting in her eyes from whatever spell she’d just cast. “I think I collected enough of your language to cast a suitable translation spell.”

“How did you do that?” Liona asked quickly. Lyna tilted her head curiously, very lupine in her movements.

“It’s a simple translation spell,” she said, as if it were obvious.

“Not simple anymore,” Liona muttered with a frown, envious.

“In any case, now I can participate in the conversation,” Lyna continued, waving a hand carelessly. “It was irritating to be unable to understand when the words were clearly so important. Now, who are you?”

Liona opened her mouth to reply that it was none of her business, but stopped. This woman had a right to know since she was the reason Solas hadn’t attacked and turned her to stone. “My name is Liona,” she said instead of the biting insult she had prepared. “I now own this castle and it is inhabited by my Inquisition, which now exists to serve and protect Thedas’s foremost religious leader.”

“How do you know my husband?” Lyna asked, examining Liona with such a critical eye that she had to fight the urge to fidget. Instead, she raised a brow sarcastically at Solas.

“Yes, Solas. How do I know you?” she asked him. He sighed heavily.

“I will explain in detail later,” he promised Lyna. “For now, suffice it to say that we were friends, for a time.”

“Be sure to tell her how I lost my arm,” Liona said bitterly.

“He took your arm?” Lyna asked, sounding alarmed. “Why?”

“The Anchor would have killed you,” Solas said, scowling. “I know you sensed it. If I had not intervened, it would have consumed you.”

“True, but the only reason I had it in the first place was your dumb idea to let a darkspawn magister kill the Divine to unlock her stupid orb!” Liona argued, her frustration spilling over.

“Can you not understand why I did it?” he asked, growing heated for the first time in years. “When I woke, everything was wrong. And I was alone. I couldn’t wake her! I feared she was lost to me, that she would never wake. If Cullen was in a coma that could potentially last an eternity and you had one long shot possibility to wake him, would you not do anything you could for him?”

“I wouldn’t give the power of a god to a monster!” Liona shouted, losing control of her temper. “Cullen would never forgive me if thousands died so that he might live!”

“I thought Corypheus would die in the blast,” Solas told her again. “And in truth, he likely did die but was reborn in one of his Warden allies. It was magic that only the Evanuris had ever achieved and I thought it was locked away with them forever! I still do not know how he acquired that ability.”

“You were friends, then?” Lyna cut in, sounding amused. Liona blinked, having been so caught up in the argument that she’d forgotten everything else for a moment. Solas sighed deeply and Liona rubbed the back of her neck in an unconscious imitation of Cullen. “I can tell,” Lyna continued. “He is always like this with his friends.” Liona peered at her to see if she was trying to make a joke. Lyna smiled. “Truly. If he did not care about you and value your opinions, he would not bother to argue.”

“Vhenan,” Solas said with a long-suffering sigh. Lyna just smiled.

Liona looked at Lyna, considering. The woman seemed very reasonable. Despite Solas claiming that she had been a spymaster, she had thus far been very direct, even blunt. And Solas clearly loved her, if they had been married for thousands of years.

“He means to destroy the world, you know,” Liona said quickly. Solas opened his mouth, scowling, but Lyna clapped her hand over it, her eyes wide with surprise.

“What do you mean?” she asked while Solas struggled futilely in her grip. It was surreal for Liona to see him so helpless.

“To restore Elvhenan, he will destroy everything and everyone that now exists,” Liona said bluntly. “My people and I have been trying to find another solution so that both our worlds might live, but without Solas’s knowledge and expertise I don’t know that we will succeed. But I won’t give up.”

Lyna removed her hand from Solas’s mouth at last but cut him off before he could say anything. “Have you explored all other options besides destruction? All of them, no stone left unturned?” Solas hesitated and Lyna sighed. “That’s what I thought.” She looked at Liona apologetically. “He’s always been reckless, I’m afraid.” Solas began to protest but Lyna just talked over him. “He acts without exploring every option. It’s his only true fault. He created the Veil before my search for a better way was complete. We’ll never know if there was another option, just that this is the one he chose.” She turned her gaze on her husband and it hardened from apologetic to determined. “I won’t let you be so reckless again. No matter how noble the goal, destroying a world is not the answer. What would Ashara say if she knew that you had destroyed everything to save her? Our first agent and our oldest friend had a kind heart. She brought the first of the others to our cause! She would be furious and distraught. You know she would. Think it through, my love. Let me find another way this time.”

Solas’s shoulders slumped and his posture drooped, his expression somewhere between defeat and relief. And for the first time, Liona dared to hope that she could get through to him. Or at least that Lyna could. They might still have a chance.

Solas closed his eyes briefly and sighed. When he opened them again, his gaze glowed blue and Liona felt herself falling as if from a great distance. She realized as she fell that she hadn’t recast her barrier and it had faded away while they talked. He caught her before she hit the ground and smiled slightly as her vision darkened.

“It is a low blow, to set my own wife against me,” he said, sounding miles away. “Yet I thank you for it. If anyone can find another way, it is her. Rest easy, now, my friend.” She felt consciousness slip away.

 

* * *

 

Liona woke slowly, feeling warm and relaxed and a bit like her head was filled with cotton. When she finally opened her eyes, Cullen was smiling down at her. When he saw that she was awake, he leaned down and kissed her softly.

“Good morning, love,” he murmured. “Sleep well?” Liona smiled and wrapped a hand around the back of his neck to pull him down for another kiss.

“Like the dead,” she told him a few moments later. “If I had any nightmares, I don’t remember them. It seems that I finally managed to sleep through a night!” She stretched luxuriously and for once was not surprised by the missing half of her left arm. Maybe she was finally getting better.

A vague memory of Solas speaking elven intruded on her thoughts, but she shook it away. She must have been dreaming of him. It wouldn’t be the first time, after all. But she had seen no sign of him since he took the Anchor and her arm with it.

Liona sat up with a smile. It was time to start another day, and though she couldn’t say why she felt better about their chances than she ever had before. Apparently a good night’s sleep really had been all she needed.

**Author's Note:**

> Well, I couldn't resist. This story essentially follows the idea of the events of Inquisition proceeding as normal (though Solas was never a romance option for Liona since he's already taken and monogamous) but Lyna was asleep beneath Skyhold the whole time, just waiting for him to wake her.
> 
> I thought it was cute, anyway.


End file.
